Apologies....

...for not posting on this blog for a while. I have been kept busy with my vacation placement at a commercial law firm which finishes at the end of this week. Readers of my blawg will be aware that this was my summer of reckoning - when I would finally decide whether to do the BVC or not. I do believe that I found my mini-pupillage infinitely better than the vacation scheme I am currently doing. My experience of the latter has not been that different to Android's experience at her new job.

I still haven't finished blawging about the final two days of the mini-pupillage I did earlier this Summer. I shall get round to that soon. In addition I will probably blawg about my experiences of working at an international commercial law firm; so you have all that to look forward to.

In terms of what I will be going next i.e. in September. I still don't know. I am still in touch with different BVC providers to see if they have any places that they can offer through clearing ('clearing', incidentally, is what it is actually called - its not something I just made up and just assumed to have always been there; I mention this because more prepared folk are unlikely to have heard of such a thing being available). Anyway, I am keeping my fingers crossed that something will come up.

What else? Well I have continued to maintain my interest in the American Presidential elections and in particular, the Democratic National Convention happening now in Denver. I absolutely love these Conventions - I think they are absolutely fantastic; really great to watch and Democracy in action. I enjoy the hair-raising speeches, the nomination process involving all the different States of the USA which are brought together. I have watched all of the first night speeches and thought it was great. Especially Michelle Obama; but also Ted Kennedy.

I must add that I am a little uncertain about Obama's choice of running-mate: Joe Biden. Admittedly, I am still learning a lot about him. My main problem is that I don't see how he can usefully help Obama win the Presidency in November. Recent polls back me up on this claim.

I have not been surprised at all that the race is becoming increasingly closer with Obama and McCain virtually neck-and-neck. McCain has benefited a lot through his negative T.V. adds against Obama. I think this just shows that he is running out of ideas. I think the closer we get to November, the less he is going to have to be negative about that he hasn't used already. Also, I am expecting that Obama's numbers are going to go through the roof when the Denver Convention is concluded and he emerges officially as the party's nominee. I don't believe that McCain will get a similar boost following his party's convention. And, if he picks Romney as his running-mate, I think he will have handed the race to Obama & Biden there and then. On the other hand, if he picks a very different kind of running-mate - the female kind - I think we could see something very different happening. I think that there are a lot of female voters that will turn to the Republicans and away from Obama and the Democrats. This will undoubtedly be costly to the Democrats in November. There are two groups of people without which any Democrat in the U.S. would not get elected to office without: Women voters and African-American voters.

I should add that I entirely understand why Obama didn't opt for a female running-mate. If he wins, his administration will already be ground-breaking: the first Black President. You can't staff a new administration or the Democratic ticket like an arc.

The Country I Love

The Obama campaign has released its first General Election ad that will be screened across America.

TV ads can, and have, destroyed even the best candidates' chances of winning elections. In recent elections, both John Kerry (2004) and John McCain (2000), have had their chances of winning severely dented because of attack ads. Attack ads work - Bush used them as a candidate against the aforementioned politicians. In the case of Kerry, it was in an attempt to reduce his Commander-in-Chief credentials; in the case of John McCain, it was the notorious illegitimate child claim that prevented McCain from winning important primaries in the 2000 campaign.

Obama's ad comes as a surprise therefore. It doesn't mention McCain his opponent in November; it doesn't mention any partisan policy issues; instead its an attempt to help more Americans understand who Barack Obama really is. It speaks of where he's come from, what he's achieved and why the next step is to be in the White House for 8 years. Here it is:

Crap Cannon: it does exactly what is says on the tin!

A couple of interesting post-election news stories involving the Democrats that I've been reading about. One quite serious; the other highly amusing.

On a serious note: Vice-President selection. A potentially tough choice for both Obama and McCain. More so for McCain, I believe.

On the Democrats' side, there's the obvious choice of Hillary Clinton. The main strength in selecting Clinton is that Obama will have gone some way to reconnecting with the 18 million Americans that voted for Clinton in the recent Primaries. The weakness - which I (unfortunately) believe counteracts that strength - is that selecting Clinton is highly indicative that Obama isn't so resolute on bringing change to American politics.

The first news story that I've been reading about suggests that Obama is keen to select a running-mate based upon their military credentials. Obviously, McCain has the advantages for appealing to a lot of Americans in this regard because of his own heroic military history. Jim Webb, it appears, is top of Obama's list. He's my favourite because I think he will help Obama a lot in the General.

The second news story that I've been reading about is the planned method of crowd control during the Democrats' National Convention in Denver. The weapon to be used is called the "crap cannon" or the "brown note" - "crap cannon" is the better description, I think. It does exactly what it says on the tin!

"it is believed to be an infrasound frequency that debilitates a person by making them defecate involuntarily"

So, if I've gotten this right, the plan is: disperse of a rowdy bunch of people by making them shit themselves on the spot. Yeah, that should do the trick. A question though: who's going to be doing the cleaning up afterwards?

Who is that Rockstar?

A crowd of 75000 people have gathered in Portland, Oregon.



The Washington Post describes the above scene as follows:

'The scene suggests this is not an exaggeration. The sea of heads stretches for half a mile along the grassy embankment, while others watch from kayaks and power boats bobbing on the Willamette River. More hug the rails of the steel bridge that stretches across the water and crowds are even watching from jetties on the opposite shore.'

Who could it possibly be? What could the occasion possibly be? So many people, so much anticipation - a concert perhaps?

Here's another pic:



Upon closer examination, the centre of attention appears to be one particular individual - on the stage at the front.

He is black, he is a politician and he is the front-runner for the Democrats' nomination for President of the United States. An unlikely scenario. Believe.

Democrats Nomination: the race is over

After primary upon primary, the race for the Democratic nomination finally seems to be drawing to an end. Like the race for the Premiership title between Chelsea and Manchester Utd, it too has gone down to the wire. Obama, rightly, is being called the presumptive nominee - it is his to lose now.

Clinton's recent victory in West Virginia was supposed to give her the defence that the 'tide is turning'; that she is the only Democrat standing that can beat McCain in November. Thankfully, its a ploy that isn't working.

Obama has recently been endorsed by John Edwards - a former contender for the Democratic nomination himself who dropped out of the race when he lost his home state of South Carolina to Barack Obama. Its difficult to tell just how much 'help' this particular endorsement will give Obama. On paper, which is really all that matters, Edwards is just another super-delegate vote that Obama will have that Clinton won't.

Speaking of super-delegates, winning a huge majority of them over, was Clinton's last throw of the dice. As of last week, Obama has long overtaken the number of pledged super-delegates that Clinton has secured. A couple of months ago he was about 100 super-delegates behind Clinton; but ahead of Clinton in the number of ordinary delegates by 100. Since then, Obama has managed to build upon his lead in both types of delegates.

It is unfortunate that Clinton has lost the way she did. She is right when she says that if the Democrats played by the same rules as the delegates - she would already be the nominee. But that's a big 'if'. Winning requires 'electioneering': you do what you can, you exploit what you can't. Things change - and if they aren't going as expected - you have to come up with a new plan. This is where Clinton fell. Riding high in the polls throughout 2007, she planned to have the nomination rapped up by Super-Tuesday. Her problem, in short, is that she mis-judged Obama.

Incidentally, I think I might just find myself in Denver where the Democratic Convention will take place in August. I will be in the US for some of August and I am crossing my fingers that I will be able to be there when Obama officially wins the nomination. I have a cousin who has already secured a place as a volunteer for that period and I am hoping that its not too late for me to follow suit.

Anyway, looking ahead to the general election in November, I have been dreading the Democrats' chances because of all this in-fighting as a result of a prolonged election. According to the polls, however, my feelings are unfounded. RealClear Politics has some very encouraging figures for Obama. My feelings were that in some of the big states that Clinton won, Obama wouldn't have as much support as he should have. The polls suggest however, that contrary to what most pundits are saying, most voters will not be siding for McCain because their preferred Democrat isn't on the ballot. Florida is an exception; but Obama is way ahead of McCain in important states including California and Pennsylvania (which I am very surprised about).

I do love electoral maps. Here's may favourite: